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My Credit Card = DENIED!

by Darwin on July 30, 2011

I learned something new tonight. I was out picking up some Indian food (which was very disappointing by the way – new management=new crappy cook…but I digress) and my credit card was declined when I went to pay for the food. I said, “that’s impossible, I just used it ten minutes ago for another errand”. He ran it again and confirmed it was being declined. I figured it had to be their crappy system, so I gave him my other card (I always carry 2 cards and we charge EVERYTHING to optimize our cash back and get $1000/year tax free). The next card went through, confirming my first card was in fact declined. So, I grabbed the food, got in the car and made a pissed off call to the card company.

What they told me was that any time you have more than 12 transactions in a day, the card is automatically locked out. I found that odd, especially if someone’s on a trip, at the mall or whatever. In our case, both my wife and I share the same card, so that’s like 6 swipes each in a day will wipe us out?! The customer service rep said this was common across the industry. I find it hard to believe but this is what I was told.

That’s what I’m trying to figure out :>
But seriously, she’s a stay at home mom. So, on Friday morning for instance, let’s say she hits the mall, buys the kids some clothes, shoes, something at the disney store, panera bread and gets gas. That’s like 5-6. Then she orders 2 gifts on line during the day for upcoming birthday parties. 8. So, I come home. I have to pick up some chemicals for the pool, pick up that card reader for the camera I’ve been meaning to get forever, grab dinner and gas. Boom! 12 uses! You’re out! It’s not an obnoxiously unreasonable day, probably under $200 spending in total – but it was 12 charges nonetheless!

I’ve never heard of this. I have called my card company before we travel because I’ve heard that if they suddenly start seeing a bunch of transactions from a location outside of where you normally make purchases, they flag it as a problem. We called before our Hawaii honeymoon in 2007, just to make sure we didn’t get locked out and stressed out!

Yup, I’ve heard of this. When I do my Christmas shopping, I usually call the cc company and tell them that I’ll be having a larger volume of transactions than normal and they flag the account in their system (got stopped once and it was a pain to juggle all the bags and boxes and try to have this call on a barely charged cell phone in the mall with Christmas music playing).

I also call them when I travel so I don’t get stopped when I’m away. We were stopped checking into a hotel for our vacation one year because we had 3 out of town transactions, and they called our house to verify the usage – and obviously, we weren’t there (we were on our vacation). It took up 45 minutes of my vacation that it shouldn’t have, so now I call them before I do anything out of the ordinary with my card. It’s just easier that way.

I read this a little earlier during my trip and did find it strange. I have not personally used so many transactions myself though, but I have run into similar limits with a debit card though it was over a month and not a day!